Soulless The Girl in the Box - By Robert J. Crane Page 0,62
the catwalk, and I hoped there was no one hiding below that could hear me. It was so dark underneath that it would be near impossible to tell. I took a fragment of duct that had blown loose from the explosion and dropped it over the side of the catwalk. I listened, but either because of the ringing in my ears or the distance it fell, I didn’t hear it land.
Ahead I saw the outline of a door, a big, heavy metal one. I urged myself forward, resting more and more weight on my wounded leg. It still stung, but I knew now that nothing was broken, which meant that all I needed to do was fight through the pain. The bad news was, there was quite a bit of it to fight through.
I reached the door and grasped the handle, turning it slowly. I pushed the heavy metal with my shoulder, trying not to rush or fall through. I cracked it and looked inside, finding a concrete room with some lockers along one wall and a set of double doors that went on into the room beyond.
I led with my gun, limping into the room. Some caution signs were posted on the double doors, but they didn’t stop me. The doors swung open for me, and I found myself in another room, walking on metal catwalks that led to a center platform with something sunken in the middle. I felt a chill; the room was like nothing I’d seen before in anything other than a movie. Large, cylindrical metal tanks were clustered below in hexagons, ominous chemical configurations written on the sides with warnings not to disturb the contents.
The whole room was cold, bitterly so, as bad as winter, and I wished for the first time that day that I’d been wearing my gloves and jacket. I felt goosebumps rise on my arms as I approached the center of the room. The catwalk gave way for the circular platform, which looked like it had a segment of metal in the middle that was removable. Exactly what it slid away for, I wasn’t sure, but it was obvious that it was patterned differently than the rest of the platform.
“Sienna?” The man’s voice caught my attention, turning me around. He was behind me, in front of the doors I had just come through, his face barely visible in the dim light of the room. He was wearing a tight shirt, no buttons, and jeans that would have stirred my imagination even if I hadn’t seen him naked the night before.
“James?” I let out a deep breath, all tension. “You found me.”
“It wasn’t that hard,” he said. “There’s only one Omega facility in eastern Wisconsin – or anywhere east until New York.” He walked down the catwalk, approaching slowly, his hands extended. “God, it looks like they tore you up...what happened?”
I brushed a strand of bloodied hair out of my face. “They fired an RPG into the duct I was using to enter the building.” I laughed under my breath, a dark chuckle without any real humor. “I wish I’d stayed in Eau Claire with you. I think it would have been less painful.”
“No kidding.” He was only a few feet away now, easing closer, when he came to a stop. “I don’t mean to be rude, because I know we’re in the middle of kind of a hostile place here, but are you gonna keep pointing your gun at me?”
“For now, yes,” I said, and the playfulness was out of my voice. “Sorry, James. I don’t really know you all that well, do I? You turn up in an Omega base at a convenient moment, and although you may genuinely be here to help me, I can’t rule out the possibility that you’re working with the enemy.”
He flushed but managed to keep his expression under control. “Ouch. So our time together doesn’t count for much, does it?”
I stared at him evenly. “Our time together was less than a cumulative hour. So, no...I don’t entirely trust you. I’m sorry if that offends you. If you turn out to be on the level, I promise I’ll make it up to you in spectacular fashion, but you’re going to have to forgive me if I don’t trust you with my life yet.”
He looked at me in cool amusement, hands at his sides. “You were going to sleep with me not twelve hours ago.”
“I was. I might still, depending on how this turns out.”